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Show HN: Parsnip – Duolingo for Cooking

parsnip.ai

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Re: Show HN: Parsnip – Duolingo for Cooking

#131

Post by mizzao »

bkandel wrote: post #119
ajb wrote: post #105

Please, please, please, avoid status cuisines . It's going to be hard to do, because they make good PR. But you will be helping your users a lot more of you hold them off with a ten foot pole. What do I mean by a status cuisine ? They are meals that are intended to show that the cook is a worthy person, rather than that the meal is practical, healthy, and good to eat. Here are some examples: The endurance cuisine: de…

> chop your own veg Is there a way to avoid this? I can get some chopped vegetables at the grocery store, but the vast majority of vegetables are only available whole.

Can you share more about why you'd want to avoid chopping your own vegetables?

Re: Show HN: Parsnip – Duolingo for Cooking

#132

Post by a-dub »

this looks cool but the data collected label in google play claims that it collects emails (under the messages heading). i believe it's probably meant to indicate that email addresses are collected, but the way it's presented it sounds like it collects actual email content. (these new labels are self-reported, right?)

Re: Show HN: Parsnip – Duolingo for Cooking

#133

Post by blindseer »

mizzao wrote: post #121
blindseer wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I tried the app too and experienced exactly the same thing. I’m surprised the app is getting as much positive reception on here as it is. Sure it is cute and “gamey”, but I don’t particularly think it’s even useful. I’d rather have the knowledge graph displayed to me in a way I can easily find information or navigate it. Why would I EVER want to use this to learn something new when I could just read the information a…

As the knowledge graph gets bigger, we're definitely going to have to find better ways to present it. The challenge is that most people don't want to see the whole knowledge graph, they want an extremely simple experience. Do you think your perspective represents something that would appeal to the mass market? Here's the technical approach we're taking with the goal of taking a very hairy knowledge graph and turning…

I think the knowledge graph in this case is mostly derived from first principles, e.g. understand roasting, searing, broiling etc and you can apply that to any vegetable or meat.

Ideally one would be able to learn language with the same kind of etymological study, however I put it to you that is FAR more complex and boring and doesn't have more fact / science based rules than cooking does.

Also, cooking is a very personal / familial / cultural experience. Recipes can be passed down a single family, whereas language is much more broad.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that the knowledge graph for cooking is smaller and more personal, and is better served as a personalized note taking system as opposed to a gamified interface to a public database.

For example, if I would prefer recipes with eggs and potatoes as opposed to recipes with spinach and mushrooms, I should be able to cater my knowledge graph to learning more about recipes that use those ingredients (ideally with some balance in nutrients).

Re: Show HN: Parsnip – Duolingo for Cooking

#134

Post by tdeck »

mizzao wrote: post #116
danpalmer wrote: post #84

I've done a few quizzes on the app now, and I don't get it. The questions feel very contrived, like someone had a quota to fill so just put whatever looked plausible together. They are also _very_ culturally specific. Questions about eggs barely made sense to me being from the UK, with incorrect pack sizes, animal welfare terms, and completely missed our great standards body that makes it easy to know which eggs have…

It sounds like you're a pretty experienced chef and we're targeting beginners (that experience question was more to get a sense of who our users are). If you consider that we're trying to start with levels 1, 2, and 3 of cooking before moving on to the far more advanced topics, do you still think it's useless? Or does your perspective change? Thanks for the note about the questions that are potentially culturally ins…

I'm curious if you've actually interviewed users who can't identify a friend vs scrambled egg and how much of this demographic exists. That example seems like something you'd learn from simply ordering breakfast a couple of times.

Re: Show HN: Parsnip – Duolingo for Cooking

#135

Post by abruzzi »

anosidium wrote: post #8

This looks incredible! I would love a macOS app as I spend more time on the Mac than on my iPhone. Well done for not enforcing account registration and letting me actually try the app.

I’d much prefer a website—I don’t really download apps anymore, and an application for Mac seems overkill.

Re: Show HN: Parsnip – Duolingo for Cooking

#136

Post by tdeck »

mizzao wrote: post #131
bkandel wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> chop your own veg Is there a way to avoid this? I can get some chopped vegetables at the grocery store, but the vast majority of vegetables are only available whole.

Can you share more about why you'd want to avoid chopping your own vegetables?

It was mentioned in the parent comment as an example of something unreasonably onerous.

Re: Show HN: Parsnip – Duolingo for Cooking

#137

Post by mizzao »

markstos wrote: post #102

For vegetarians or vegans browsing the site, it's not clear if they should even bother to install the app, because there's no clarification of whether the app has a single idea of what "good food" is. One of the examples on the front page is unlocking a cheeseburger recipe.

Are you saying that there should be a single idea of what "good food" is?

I personally don't think any particular dish is good or bad, but how well it's cooked.

Re: Show HN: Parsnip – Duolingo for Cooking

#138

Post by Spivak »

markstos wrote: post #102

For vegetarians or vegans browsing the site, it's not clear if they should even bother to install the app, because there's no clarification of whether the app has a single idea of what "good food" is. One of the examples on the front page is unlocking a cheeseburger recipe.

If your definition of "good food" excludes literally the most popular dish in America then you might want to consider that your tastes are a bit niche.

I don't understand why so many people consider anything part of US culinary tradition to be bad while seemingly giving a pass to everyone else like it isn't a different arrangement of meat, dairy, carbs, salt, and acid.

Re: Show HN: Parsnip – Duolingo for Cooking

#139

Post by mizzao »

theonething wrote: post #128

Does it help with organizing meal planning and generate shopping lists? Those would be killer features. Bonus is automatic online ordering of ingredients. Something that generates weekly meal plans taking into consideration food preferences, nutrition, time, availability of ingredients, etc and then tells me what to buy or orders it for me.

That's the plan! I've actually written a memo about that: https://parsnip.substack.com/p/vision-part-one

It'll take us a few years to get there, though.

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